Happy Endings Are All The Same
by Sunny D1
Summary: The good guys don't always win, things don't only go bump at night and love isn't always enough.
1. Default Chapter

TITLE: Happy Endings Are All The Same

AUTHOR: Sunny D

DISCLAIMER: Thankfully it all belongs to Joss

RATING: PG

PAIRINGS: B/A, B/S implied

NOTES: takes place in BtVS S6 up to 'Doublemeat Palace' and Angel early S3, but Pylea, Darla and Connor never happened, (oh if only…)

The sun shone warmly over a quiet Sunnydale afternoon and Buffy covered the final yards to her house at the same languid pace she'd enjoyed the rest of the walk. It was the first time that week her shift had finished early enough for her to catch daylight, and she couldn't suppress an excited smile as she strolled up her driveway. Easily balancing the two shopping bags that contained actual food, she anticipated the long soak that would start her peaceful afternoon, as she slipped her key in the lock. Her mind cheerfully preoccupied, Buffy had fully shut the door before she picked up the mechanical sound of Willow's voice coming from the kitchen.

"…took a little longer than expected, what with all the decisions and Xander unable to choose between sprinkles and chocolate chips…"

Buffy's grin widened as she entered the kitchen and settled the shopping bags on the counter.

"…but we're on our way home now so – *what was that*?"

Abandoning the food, Buffy raced to grab the phone.

"Will?" she asked, instantly worried, but the phone on the other side had been forgotten.

"Erm Will, not to encourage the use of magic…" Buffy heard a nervous Xander suggest, and she suddenly found it difficult to breathe, her heart thumping erratically with fear at what her friends might be witnessing.

"I can't, I burnt it out last week…" Willow responded, her voice a terrified whisper.

"_WILL_?" she tried again, her voice raised to a desperate shout, but almost immediately she had to yank the phone from her ear as a deafeningly sharp crack filled the line. Pulling the handset back to her face she barely caught Xander's yelled, "_No Dawn, through the car park,_" before she was running for the door at Slayer speed.  

It took her half a minute to race from the house to the abandoned car park six streets away and only 2 seconds to spot the Broman demon and snap its neck from behind. But it was 32 seconds too long, and Buffy didn't need to approach the body that used to be Dawn to know that she was dead. 

Watching in shock as Willow gently closed the eyes of the crumpled, broken figure; Xander didn't notice Buffy slip away as abruptly as she had come.

The front door still hung wide open and she didn't shut it as she entered. Wandering back into the kitchen, she stared at the bulging shopping bags and tried to make sense of the last five minutes. She felt she should be unpacking them, putting aside the items she'd bought for dinner, the first meal she'd cook for Dawn in far too long. Simultaneously, she tried to process the overwhelming new knowledge that thoughts like this weren't necessary anymore. The battle was over, and it was lost. 'But how could it be lost?' the first part persisted. Dawn was the reason she dragged herself to mind-numbingly long shifts in the Doublemeat Palace day after day. Hell, for a long time Dawn was the only reason she'd dragged herself out of bed at all, putting on the façade of living when really she was just existing. She'd made a promise and she'd tried so hard to keep it - it couldn't end like this, in a car park, on a Saturday afternoon, for no reason. How could it end like this?

Turning, she reached up and grabbed the small pickle jar from the top shelf of the spice rack. Trying not to see the 'EMERGENCY MONEY' printed in Dawn's precise cursive script, she pulled out the bills, screwed the lid back on and placed it neatly back before exiting the house a final time.

She didn't run, didn't even walk fast, just let her feet guide her. Not Willy's, too many demons looking to start a fight. Jake's? Closed too early. The Red Dog? No questions, no ID, no familiar faces – perfect. 

She vaguely remembered the last time she'd been drunk. Hanging out in the crypt with Spike. It seemed several lifetimes ago. She hadn't enjoyed the experience, it was painful, disconcerting and made her feel out of control. There were too many people depending on her – too many responsibilities – for her to be out of control. But now…there was nothing. She could feel the pain, the despair, the overwhelming fury at the unfairness of it all lapping at her consciousness, threatening to break down the walls that contained them; but she concentrated on the pavement - which cracks she shouldn't step on, she counted the number of red cars and she wondered which drink to start with.

Getting drunk is no matter of accident for a Slayer, her natural defences fight the invasion of alcohol as though it were a threat. The body desperately resisting the confusion, the temptation to relax and be carefree, the out of body feeling and the general dampening effects of the alcohol. It takes a concentrated effort for a Slayer to become truly inebriated and it was a task Buffy set about with determined single-mindedness.

Twelve shots of neat whiskey later and she wasn't having to concentrate on not thinking about that horrible thing that she really didn't want to think about, it was still there but it didn't threaten to engulf her. The bartender was lining up the shots as far as the $100 she'd given him would allow, no longer afraid that the young, seemingly innocent, girl would have any trouble handling her liquor, instead amused that a hardened drinker would still grimace after each mouthful.

Customers came and customers left and Buffy kept right on drinking. Another six shots and she was beginning to see the funny side of the situation. A Broman demon  - of all things – a creature she could kill with her eyes closed - without supernatural strength – hell, with no arms, it was strong but not very smart. That Dawn should die at the hands of a *Broman* demon; well, that was just plain funny. She downed another shot, completely at ease now, and wondered why she'd never noticed how silly people looked through the bottom of a shot glass. Attempting to explain her observation to the bartender she found talking was suddenly very difficult, and anyway, he seemed to be giving her the evil eye as she filled her empty glasses with nuts from the large bowl on his bar top. When time was finally called in the early hours of the morning she found she was in love with the world at large, the smallest things were sources of hilarity and more importantly, she couldn't feel her legs.

After much trouble - and a little help from the barman - she finally stood outside. The stinging cold air whipped her light sweater closer to her body forcing her to take a long draught from her whiskey bottle in order to stave off any semblance of sobriety. The night was beautiful and silent. The local demons knew better than to mess with a Slayer, drunk as she might seem, and Buffy felt like a walk. 

She'd passed the 'Welcome To Sunnydale' sign hours back when a car slowed to a crawl beside her. The driver rolled down his window to call out to the attractive young girl who was stumbling along the edge of the increasingly busy freeway oblivious to the annoyed car horns and the fact that she'd be killed before she got anywhere near her destination. 

"Kid, you wanna lift?" 

And she'd accepted, the notion of danger from a mere human a long forgotten worry.


	2. Chapter 2

TITLE: Happy Endings Are All The Same

AUTHOR: Sunny D

DISCLAIMER: Thankfully it all belongs to Joss

RATING: PG

PAIRINGS: B/A, B/S implied

NOTES: takes place in BtVS S6 up to 'Doublemeat Palace' and Angel early S3, but Pylea, Darla and Connor never happened, (oh if only…)

There's no such thing as a quiet night in LA; the glare of neon lighting illuminates the darkness until it rivals the brightness of day, allowing the city's dwellers to pursue hectic 24 hour lives. With the human residents permanently out to play, the city shines out like an all-night snack bar, attracting every type of unsavoury creature of darkness.  

But not this night. 

There were no helpful visions from Cordelia, no cries for help despite hours spent trawling the city's streets, and seemingly no hopeless souls in need of a saviour. Angel finally retraced his steps to the hotel just before dawn, feeling restless and wound up. 

Shedding the weight of his leather duster he briefly considered trying to sleep, but lying awake with all this nervous energy was a recipe guaranteed to lead his mind to bad places, and while it would probably surprise his friends to know it, he didn't actually invite brooding thoughts.

Deciding that a few hours with a punching bag would relieve some of the tension he felt humming through his body, he turned to head for the basement, but as he passed 

the front desk and the huge pile of case files that still needed closing, he scrapped that idea too. If they could make a dent in their increasing backlog of paperwork, they could actually get paid, and more importantly, he could look forward to five minutes peace from Cordelia. 

He was still wide awake and buried in paperwork when he caught the sound of Wesley's familiar step in the foyer hours later. A glance at the clock caused the vampire to shake his head in awe, boss of the company and not so much as a minute late; the Englishman was truly impressive.

"Angel?" Wesley exclaimed, stopping in the doorway surprised. "Shouldn't you be resting?"

"Hey Wes," Angel responded with a sigh. He closed the file on the telekinetic girl that would probably only net them enough money for Cordelia to buy a new handbag, before looking up and stretching. "I'm feeling kind of…" he paused, wondering what it was that had been bothering him all morning, "…antsy," he finished lamely.

"In the sense of something evil approaching?" Wesley enquired eagerly in a tone that was partly fearful concern at the possible impending danger, but also worryingly close to 'this will require books' excitement.

"Not sure," Angel told him, rising from the desk so that Wesley could stop hovering uncertainly in that very subtle way he had as he slowly adjusted to his new position as boss.

"Hmmm, the Agrican prophesy is supposed to transpire sometime this year, but I'm fairly sure it's in the Eastern hemisphere. Now the rising of the Dukard Warrior…" Wesley ran excited fingers along the top of a bookshelf considering obscure titles that he had once boasted were intelligible to only a select few in the world, but had failed to add were of interest to even less, "…could well be in this part of the world. But there's very little information pertaining to the time frame..."

"I'll just be upstairs," Angel interrupted him, inching out of the room.

"Right," Wesley mused in response, his eyes never leaving the shelf.

A long hot shower and a change of clothes later, Angel's mood was no lighter and he had begun to consider the merits of the work-out after all when the bedside phone rang.

"Angel…" the minute pause was barely noticeable but it was so unlike Cordelia to ever hold back from saying anything that the vampire's stomach immediately clenched and he knew with a painful certainty that it had to be bad news, "…it's Willow."

They really had to start calling each other for reasons other than delivering bad news, he mused despondently as Cordelia put the call through.

"Angel?" A breathless voice came on the line.

"Willow, what's wrong?" Angel asked gently, trying not to panic, bad news didn't mean she was dead…again.

"Have you seen or heard from Buffy?" she asked anxiously.

"Not since…" he paused, remembering a car park, somewhere not here and not there, "…not for a while. Is she hurt?"

"No, it's…" Willow paused and Angel heard her collect herself. 

The situation was coldly familiar.

"…Dawn's dead," she finally managed. "A Broman demon. Yesterday," she continued, verbalising the thoughts in whatever order they came to her. She didn't spit them out quickly as though afraid that they would choke her – like she did the last time she'd had to give him similar news – but her voice was weary and it was hard to get past her pain to take in the message.  "Buffy killed it, but we haven't seen her since".

Buffy's little sister - the reason she'd jumped off that scaffold to her death the first time, and the only reason she hadn't the second - was gone. The antsy feeling turned into a full-out painful ache and Angel wondered if she was somewhere breaking into more pieces than they would be able to put back together this time.

 "Angel?" Willow asked, the vampire's lack of respiration making it difficult to tell whether he was still on the line.

"Yeah?" he reassured her, trying to focus.

"If she comes to you…just take care of her till we get there?"

"I will," he promised. And then there was just the empty tone.

He slumped back in his chair sighing tiredly and wondering if Buffy had remained the fragile creature he'd met in the car park that night, because if she had, there was no telling what she might be doing now.

"He's been up there for a while, maybe I should go up," Cordelia suggested, dumping her filing on the front desk and startling her colleagues.

"He's been up there for 10 minutes Cordelia, give him some time," Wesley called from his office.

"Sunnydale's already killed the woman he loves twice, anything could have happened," Cordelia argued, her concern evident despite her bluntness.

"If the man wanted to talk he'd come down," Gunn reminded her, deliberately failing  to recall the last time Angel had needed to talk but chosen not to, preferring to spiral down a destructive downward slope instead. 

"Jeez, you guys are so – Angel!" Cordelia exclaimed, catching sight of him. "What happened?"

"Dawn's dead," Angel announced without preamble, descending the final steps to the foyer, "A Broman demon. Buffy's missing."

"You think she might come here?" Cordelia asked in that gentle way she had on the rare occasion when she forgot that her sole reason for existing was to make everybody else's life miserable.

Sighing tiredly, Angel leaned on the front desk, "We haven't been very close, I don't know if she…" he stopped suddenly, straightening up as he felt a familiar tingle down his spine. The others followed his gaze to the glass hotel doors and a second later she was there - fumbling with the handle, seemingly disorientated. 

Angel crossed the floor to meet her, getting as close as he could without stepping into the morning sunlight.

"Angel!" Buffy slurred, stumbling inside. Most of her hair had escaped from the bun at the back of her head and hung limply framing her pale, tired features. Her sweater was dirty and her skirt revealed an almost indecent amount of skin through a long ragged tear as she leaned heavily back on the door to steady herself, before attempting to take a swaying step forward. "I…" she hiccupped, "…caught you."

Even if the stench of alcohol hadn't hung on her like an old friend, the almost empty, family sized Jack Daniels she held clutched precariously in her left hand would have revealed the story of the night's activities to any in doubt.

"Buffy…?" Angel started alarmed, wanting to reach out and hold her; but sunlight separated them and she seemed unable to leave the door and close the distance.

"I just wanted to say goodbye," she announced, speaking carefully as though trying to hide the effort it took to hunt through an alcohol-addled mind for each word in the sentence.

"Where are you going?" he asked gently, his concern growing tenfold.

Buffy paused, screwing up her features as she tried to recall the plan she had decided on during the dizzying drive into the city.

"The Hellmouth," she suddenly recalled with a self-congratulatory point of a finger, "I turn around and…" she hiccupped again, loudly, "…it's sent some new evil out…" hiccup "…to kill someone I love, so I thought I'd go down there…" hiccup "…and find out what the big idea was." 

She spoke coherently, but far too calmly to be at all conscious of her words and Angel prepared to grab her from the sunlight should she make any move out of the door.

Instead she took a shaky step toward him finally letting go of the door-frame.

"You know who we *really* need right now?" she asked, swaying slightly as she eyed him quizzically. 

She opened her mouth to continue and then abruptly clamped it shut looking like she was about to retch. The alcohol swished inside the bottle and her swallow was audible in the stillness of the room as the other occupants watched the Slayer in stunned silence, wondering what would come out of her mouth next. 

"Angelus," she finally choked out, and the tone of the silence changed to shocked confusion. "He's always got some great end of the world plan cooking." She took another unsteady step toward Angel. One more and he'd be able to grab her.

Her eyes slipped slowly to half mast and she paused in her forward motion, trying desperately to stay on her feet.

"Buffy, I heard what happened," Angel started softly, trying not to scare her, "I think you need to…"

"What?" She cut him off, her eyes wide and alert again, her tone angry, "Lie down? Sleep it off? Cry a little?" 

She giggled suddenly, stepping sideways as the laugh upset her balance further. 

"I don't think I have any water left Angel," she confided, staring into his eyes, the glassy expression in her own explaining the smile on her face. "I mean I cried when you died, I cried when you left," she stumbled backward a step nearly tripping over her ankle length skirt, and Angel's heart that couldn't beat contracted painfully as he ached to soothe away so much suffering, created by a list that started with the hurt he had caused. 

"I cried over Mom. I cried over Riley," she giggled again, "By the time I died I was all cried out. So this time around," she lifted the whiskey bottle in a salute to the room, "I thought I'd have a drink".

She stopped abruptly, arm still held high, then like an invisible hand had cut her strings she fell forward, the bottle shattering in a shower of glass and amber liquid just before Angel caught her.


	3. Chapter 3

TITLE: Happy Endings Are All The Same AUTHOR: Sunny D DISCLAIMER: Thankfully it all belongs to Joss RATING: PG PAIRINGS: B/A, B/S implied NOTES: takes place in BtVS S6 up to 'Doublemeat Palace' and Angel early S3, but Pylea, Darla and Connor never happened, (oh if only.)  
  
  
  
Afternoon sunshine burned brightly around the edges of Angel's heavy bedroom drapes. Another thin slice of light crept under the door from the hallway. Neither was enough to disturb the dark, stillness of the room.  
  
Buffy stirred, her first movement in hours, and Angel hesitated in turning the page of the book that he wasn't really reading. She expelled a stream of air and he leaned forward to touch the now dry towel to her forehead, gently brushing back her hair. She settled, burrowing deeper into his sheets and he discarded his book to stare at her in rapt attention, wondering how long it would take her super-strong body to recover from the alcohol, how long he had left to be this close to her, and how long he could enjoy the wonderful sensation of her presence under his skin.  
  
He remembered her hurrying off a bus and across a motorway, too excited to be concerned with oncoming traffic. He remembered her crushing embrace and her strangely altered scent as she held him as though he were the float that would keep her from drowning. And he remembered the pain in her eyes as she stepped out of his arms realising that he would not give free reign to his emotions - despite all she had been through.  
  
When they met in that car park there was no fictional 'normal' for her to aspire to, no life of laughter and sunshine to expect, even he couldn't pretend. She had experienced Heaven, what could compare? Except she had looked at him with those eyes that told him he was the only thing Heaven didn't have - and unable to stand it, he had looked away.  
  
The painful recollections were disturbed by Buffy's suddenly ragged breathing, and he reached for the bucket again, but her body had already expelled everything it could dislodge and her breathing returned to normal. Gingerly touching a dark circle under her eye, Angel wondered how long it had been since she last slept so peacefully. Would she have these circles if he'd damned the consequences and insisted she come back to LA with him that night? He wouldn't have had to insist, not because she still believed that love conquered all - that innocence had faded a while ago - but because she'd looked so lost, so in need of somebody to take care of her, and she'd looked at him with trust and longing. Would Dawn still be alive if he had responded to her obvious need and taken them both under his wing, loving one slowly back to life and giving the other stability? Instead he'd walked away, again, reasoning that she was strong and whatever she suffered would be nothing compared to the anguish Angelus could cause.  
  
And here they were once more, another crossroad, another heart-wrenching decision to be made. Angel touched her mascara smudged eyelids gently and wondered which of her many expressions they would open to reveal. If she woke up and looked at him with those beseeching, vulnerable eyes that made him want to offer his soul to any interested party, could he make that decision again? How many times could he break her heart because he loved her and didn't trust himself? 


	4. Chapter 4

TITLE: Happy Endings Are All The Same

AUTHOR: Sunny D

DISCLAIMER: Thankfully it all belongs to Joss

RATING: PG

PAIRINGS: B/A, B/S implied

NOTES: takes place in BtVS S6 up to 'Doublemeat Palace' and Angel early S3, but Pylea, Darla and Connor never happened, (oh if only…)

The sun had set and the room was blanketed in darkness when Buffy woke to mind-splitting pain and a bed she didn't recognise. The torture of moving her head tempted her to simply remain prone, but her Slayer survival instincts forced her to ignore the discomfort and rotate her neck for some clue as to her location. Sore, bloodshot eyes connected with a large figure in the chair beside her bed and suddenly a familiar tingling in her body pronounced itself above the myriad of other feelings, forcing her to bite back a gasp of alarm that would certainly wake her companion. She stared at him, her brain struggling to endure the agony in order to churn through the slew of thoughts assaulting her. What was she doing in Angel's…? And then she remembered the bar, and crashing in with that memory came the rest of the night and, though a second before she would not have thought it possible, her heart curled in on itself and the pain became worse.

Swiftly she sat up in bed, welcoming the nausea it brought on, because you can't linger on painful thoughts about promises you failed to keep and another member of your already small family that you will never see again, when somebody is driving an extremely long nail through the centre of your head with mind-numbing precision. Of course the action brought to life the unnaturally still figure beside her, but even that was preferable to the black hole threatening on the edge of her subconscious.

Angel leaned forward to snap on the bedside lamp and Buffy winced despite its soft glow. She saw him reach out a tentative hand and flinched away from his touch, angry that some unconscious part of herself, no doubt the same part that had carried her to the one person she couldn't stand to be with, wanted him to touch her, to comfort her. She swung her legs over the side of the bed, firmly resisting the urge to clutch her throbbing head.

"Where are you going?" he asked gently, undeterred.

She could feel the resentment smouldering inside her flare up to scorch the back of her throat and she barely squeezed out a curt, "Home," before it choked off further explanation.

His concerned gaze bored into her averted face as she scanned his floor for her boots and she sent up a silent plea to whatever Powers might be watching that he wouldn't speak, that he would just let her get her things and leave. That way they could go back to that non-communication thing they were doing so well and it would be like she'd never even turned up on his doorstep.

But as usual the Powers paid no heed to her desires.

"I think you should stay here tonight," he suggested quietly, and it was like somebody had thrown lighter fluid on the burning coals in her chest.

Her head swivelled to pin him with a look and for a second all the hate and rage and pain that she felt towards him glittered clearly out of hard green eyes as she responded with an equally quiet, "Really?" Then, almost as quickly as it had appeared, the expression disappeared as she plastered on something friendly and entirely dishonest. It wasn't his fault she was there and she really didn't want to get into a discussion about her feelings. She conjured up an apologetic smile, "I'm sorry, I've already wrecked your day, I have no right to be rude." 

"You didn't wreck my day Buffy," he assured her quickly, but she'd already offered him all the charity she could spare and he found himself talking to thin air as she crossed the room to her boots.

 "Was I wearing a jacket?" she asked, focused once again on the task of leaving.

He paused, trying not to stammer in confusion, "Uh, no," then opened his mouth to continue but found himself ungraciously interrupted. 

"Good. I'm just going to use your bathroom," she announced, already escaping into the adjoining room. 

She closed the door and leaned against it for a moment, trying to cool the feverish roaring in her head against its cool surface. The churn of emotions Angel inspired sat on top of the aching in her skull and alongside the gnawing pain of what she couldn't forget she had just lost, and altogether it was too much. She couldn't handle Angel now; she didn't have the strength.

She straightened and snapped on the light, blinking at its strength, her head throbbing a little harder in response. But it was quiet in here, and he was out there; she just needed to compose herself, gather the strength to walk past him and out.

Stepping forward to the sink she took in her surroundings. His bathroom was immaculate, gleaming in its whiteness, everything clean and perfectly ordered. Typical Angel. She turned on the tap and held her hands under the cooling stream. Was this the way he wanted his life? Neat and ordered, nothing burning out of control, or taking up more space than he allocated? Nothing that he couldn't control or predict? 

'Stop it Buffy,' she mentally chastised herself, but she could almost feel him pacing outside that door, probably wondering what to say to make it better, totally oblivious to the fact that kind words from him just made it a million times worse. Why did he only bother to care when she was falling apart? Wasn't she worth loving whole and happy? She felt her gut clench with bitter anger and raised a cupped, water-filled hand to her face hoping that washing the sour taste of vomit from her mouth would soothe the rest of her body.

It didn't. 

She rinsed her face and turned off the tap, straightening. All she had to do was walk – fast - past him, down the stairs, out the front door. Ally his fears, assure him she was fine, it was what he wanted to believe anyway.

Damn, why couldn't she have just got drunk and jumped off a bridge or something? Instead she had to keep spinning back to him like some kind of boomerang, check in for a little more pain and heartache.  

She dried her face on a neatly folded towel, smoothed down her hair and opened the bathroom door.

 "Thanks for the bed," she paused long enough to say while heading for the door and before Angel could summon up the words his frown suggested he wanted to voice, the door stood ajar and she was gone. 

Angel was so intent on deciding what to say to Buffy next, it took him a second to notice the commotion downstairs.

"Listen bitch, if I wanted to kill you, you'd already be lying there with your throat ripped out." An angry cockney voice rang out from below. "I just want to know if the Slayer's here."

 Angel quickened his step wondering why Spike was suddenly so impatient to see Buffy, after all he'd had a good couple of years to fail at killing her, a few more minutes weren't going to increase his chances.

"The only reason why you aren't already dust Spike is because Angel might prefer to do it himself," Wesley calmly replied.

"Spike," Buffy's voice joined the conversation, it sounded strangely cheerful, and Angel turned the corner to see her descending the stairs towards the aggravating blond.  "Making new friends?" she asked sweetly, indicating the three crossbows pointing directly at Spike's chest.

"Slayer," Spike breathed a sigh of relief and above him Angel stopped dead, his eyes locked on his grandchilde. In the unnaturally long time that he had known the vicious young demon, he could recall him using that tone with exactly one person. Slowly, he took in the vampire's dishevelled appearance; the bloodshot eyes that suggested he had spent the day with them wide open, waiting for night, the blond hair that looked like it had been raked over by restless hands in every direction before letting the night air play its part, the wrinkled clothes that had obviously been on for a couple of days. 

"Where've you been?" Spike demanded, but his eyes were narrowed in badly disguised concern and Angel switched his gaze to Buffy with rapidly increasingly alarm.

"Drinking," she responded, apparently used to the familiarity that to Angel was so new and strange. He forced himself to move again.

"Ready to go?" Buffy asked, reaching the bottom step and ignoring the three people itching to turn Spike into a dusty pile. Pleased and relieved that despite running off to LA she wasn't planning to stay, Spike nodded and they turned for the door.

"Buffy!" Angel called out hurrying down the stairs and immediately drawing all eyes to himself. She turned back to face his approaching figure and Spike tensed, taking a possessive step closer to her, his eyes practically daring Angel to make a move on the woman standing beside him. Angel ignored the look to address himself to Buffy.

"You're not dealing with this," he told her, a quick glance over her shoulder including the company she was keeping as part of the problem.

 "Angel, I'm sorry I dragged you into this," she patiently echoed her words from earlier.

"Why?" he asked, confused.

She sighed, "Something bad happens in my life and I come running to you, that is so high school".

Cordelia dropped the bolt from her crossbow behind them, no doubt surprised to hear Buffy voice what she had always thought. Angel ignored her, determined to make his point understood this time.

"You don't have to apologise Buffy, I am always here for you," he told her softly, but a short unpleasant laugh from Spike ruined the moment and Buffy couldn't help raising an eyebrow as she responded with an unconvincing, "Yeah", then turned once again to go. 

"Buffy?" Angel's hand on her forearm pulled her back to face him and Spike growled, whirling to stand menacingly in his face; only Buffy's lightning-fast reaction stopped him from ripping into his grandsire. The tension was tangible as the two vampires stood over the woman they loved, one willing to do anything for her but stay, the other ready to do anything but leave. Buffy was reminded of a similar face–off in her dorm room so long ago, and like then, she didn't have the energy or the inclination for a macho, alpha male contest. 

 "Spike!" It could have been the rasp of fatigue underlying the warning in her voice, or Spike's quick glance into her weary blood-shot eyes, but to the collective surprise of the room he took a step back, giving her physical space, but angry eyes warning her that Angel was still far too close. 

Trying to suppress a relieved sigh, Buffy switched her attention to Angel and found him staring at her, his face closed and impenetrable. Shrugging out of his grasp she raised a questioning eyebrow and he picked up the thread of conversation where Spike had broken it.

"Buffy, you're not okay," he told her seriously, after a pause.

Spike guffawed from his position behind them as though the observation were hilarious and Angel lost his neutral mask, an angry scowl on his face drawing a graphic picture of the various ways he desperately wanted to torture and kill his grandchilde.

Buffy sighed again, trying to be patient with him. "Angel, I haven't been okay in a long time," she told him soberly; but his attention wasn't on her.

"Can we go somewhere without an audience?" he asked, his eyes fixed on the figure behind her.

She waved an irritated hand in his face to draw his eyes back to her, "We have nothing left to say Angel, I'm going home."

"And then what? You're going to patrol? Act like everything is okay?" he demanded, annoyance creeping into his voice as concern, jealousy, confusion and a wave of other emotions bubbled over inside him.

"No. I *also* have funeral arrangements to make," she threw back, angry now.

"And that's it? You're just going to move on?" His voice rose as he stared into the cold eyes of a girl he did not recognise.

"What do you want me to do? Break down and cry on your shoulder? Open up and share the pain? Let you inside?" she asked sarcastically, each suggestion a cutting barb.

"I want you to act like you care!" he thundered back at her. 

A deafening silence choked every sound from the room. Buffy's face burnt crimson as she fought to control emotions that threatened both tears and violence. Angel took an instinctive step back, immediately contrite, but the hateful glare on Buffy's face told him it was too late for remorse.

She sucked in a breath and he braced himself for a tide of anger.

"Everybody I love dies or they leave," she finally spat out between clenched teeth, "and it doesn't matter how much I *care* about them." Her eyes bored into him and there was no reply he could make; Joyce and Dawn had had no choice over leaving her, he had. But he thought she'd understood, she'd let him go so easily, surely she understood.

"Buffy, I didn't leave to hurt you," he told her, gently but slightly impatient.

She caught his tone and felt her ire rise as she raised a hand to silence him, "Stop I think I know this one," she mocked coldly.

"Buffy…" he started, annoyed.

"No," she interrupted, "You've lived for 250 years, how many Slayers have you known with children and white picket fences and days spent frolicking in the frigging sunshine?" she demanded.

He sighed, "That doesn't mean…"

"That I can't be the first?" she finished for him. "What, because you said so? Jeez, join us on this planet why don't you."

"Oh, well *you* clearly have two feet planted on the ground," Angel threw back forgetting he was supposed to be comforting and supportive, "Is there a reason you're hanging out with Mr Chaos and Mayhem over there?" Angel indicated Spike with a disgusted jerk of his head.

After the day and night that he'd just had, Spike wanted nothing more than to work out his pain in a good hard fight and Buffy had to plant herself solidly in front of him to stop him surging forward.

"My life is none of your business," Buffy told him simply, tired of the conversation, "Seems to me if you cared you wouldn't have left." She tossed out the simple statement that summed up their relationship as far as she was concerned and with it dismissed her former lover for what she hoped would be the last time. "How are we travelling?" she asked Spike, turning to face him.

"Bike," Spike replied shortly, still itching to pound Angel into the ground.

"Good, let's break some speed limits," she suggested walking around him and heading for the door, hoping that he wanted to follow her more than he wanted to fight his grandsire.

The, "Whatever you say Slayer," that finally answered her made her smile and she noted absently that it was almost impossible to be depressed around Spike. 

The cold night air hit her as they stepped outside and she couldn't wait to leave behind 'falling apart, can't deal Buffy' that Angel always seemed to inspire. You fight, shit happens and you die, it was a simple equation, Spike knew it, she was finally getting it, Angel could live in denial for the rest of eternity if he wanted but that was the truth of it. Sanity, peacefulness, happiness…fleeting moments at best; it was time to let go of all of that, fight the fight and then let go. 

She stopped at the expensive looking, no doubt stolen, bike parked in front of the hotel and was a little startled to feel a warm, comforting weight settle around her shoulders.

"Maybe the next time you decide to leave town you could take a jacket," Spike suggested gruffly as she shrugged into his leather coat.

"It's not like you need it," she reminded him, hitching her skirt up so that she could slide onto the bike behind him.

"It's a *look* Buffy," he told her pointedly, before starting the engine.

Buffy wrapped her arms around his body and leaned her head on his back with a smile. 'Fight and then let it go' she told herself again, life was so much more bearable when you learned the rules. 

In the hotel lobby Angel stood staring numbly at the empty doorway, feeling like he'd skipped an entire chapter in their relationship. There was no reconciling the angry, disillusioned young woman who'd just walked out with the sweet girl he used to know. It was like the broken pieces had all come back together - wrong.

Somewhere behind him he heard Gunn ask if his ex had ever dated humans, but he had no energy to waste on taking offence.

He wondered where the break had come. All those times he'd walked away; the lost day, her mother's funeral, that deserted car park, were they his opportunities to save her? How many times had she fallen before she decided it wasn't worth getting up again? 

The ever-present companion that was his guilt would never allow him to believe that he gave enough in their relationship to justify what he took from her, but as he stood in his cavernous hotel, the voices of his colleagues, people he loved but never with the passion and ferocity that he cared for Buffy, bickering softly in the background, he wondered for the first time if maybe what they'd had was enough. He wondered if the moments of happiness they'd shared had been the best the world had been willing to allow her. He remembered how every glance she'd sent his way that day had been equal parts hurt and rage, and the happy ending he'd sacrificed their relationship for twisted painfully in his empty gut.


End file.
